Chapter 11 #2
“You’re so talented.” He thought of the stolen Vivi notebook, half-filled with her designs. “The lynx you drew for me is better than anything I’ve seen in a professional portfolio. The dragon from yesterday could be a book cover right now. The warrior women series—”
“You’ve been looking through my notebook?”
“You left it open on the desk.”
“That’s not the same as an invitation to browse.”
“Threat assessment.”
She threw a sugar packet at him. He caught it without looking, which made her eyes narrow in a way that was half annoyed, half impressed.
“The point is,” she said, “I’ve been hiding behind the excuse that my art isn’t ready.
That I’m not ready. But maybe that’s just fear wearing a disguise.
” She toyed with the cup. “Penn used to say that the difference between an artist and a person who draws is that the artist ships. Puts it out there and lets people see it.”
“Smart man.”
Something passed between them—a recognition that he’d said that without the weight of what had happened. Just an honest acknowledgment that the man who’d said those words to his sister had been right.
No more regrets about the past.
“He was,” she said softly.
Sebastian poured himself a second cup and leaned against the counter. He watched her stare into the distance, thinking about Penn, her art, her future.
She was going to leave the compound and return to her life. Build a website, sell her art, and apply to schools. She was going to become the person she was supposed to be before Penn’s death had derailed everything.
He wanted that for her. Fiercely and without reservation. He wanted her to have every piece of the future she’d been denied.
He just didn’t fit inside it. They were both here in Montana for now, but if she went back to school…
Space was the thing he was afraid of. Space was where people reconsidered and the clarity of crisis faded into the ambiguity of ordinary life.
Where a woman who’d fallen for her protector realized that the man behind the gun was just a man—quiet, emotionally stunted, still learning how to keep his hand open instead of clenched.
Stop. He was doing it again. The thing Vivi had warned him about—treating his feelings as threats instead of information. Running worst-case scenarios instead of trusting the data.
Unfortunately, the data now skewed toward her leaving here. Leaving me.
He picked up the sugar packet she’d thrown at him and returned it to the spot beside her mug.
She glanced at it, then at him, and the corner of her mouth curved. “You’re hovering, Lynx.”
“Protective detail.”
“Of my coffee?”
“It’s a high-value asset.”
She shook her head. The smile stayed. “I think there’s a higher value asset who needs her back washed.”
He pulled her from the chair and turned her toward the door. “Good thing I’m properly trained in that, too.”
Her laughter made him smile as they walked back to their shared room.
Claire arrived at thirteen hundred, interrupting the afternoon.
He’d been reviewing Jasper’s latest analysis of the FBI’s data while Sutton sketched beside him. They’d spent most of the day like that—side by side at the conference room table, working in parallel, the kind of comfortable silence he’d never shared with anyone.
She drew. He read. Occasionally, she’d hold up a design for his opinion. In return, he’d slide the laptop toward her to show her a connection he’d found. The rhythm of it felt domestic in a way that made his chest ache.
When Claire walked in with Garrett, her face carried a different energy than on previous visits. Less tension. More resolution. The look of a woman who’d been pushing a boulder uphill for days and had finally gotten it to the summit.
The team assembled, including Vivi, her cardigan wrapped around her like armor. Sutton sat at the table with her notebook closed, her hands flat on the cover, her posture braced for impact.
Sebastian stayed beside her, close enough to touch, but not hovering. Okay, maybe a little.
Claire set her phone on the table and leaned forward with both palms flat. “Booker talked.”
Sutton glanced between her and him. “What does that mean?”
“It took three days, two attorneys, and a plea negotiation that went through three levels of DOJ approval, but he’s cooperating. Limited cooperation—he’s protecting himself above all—but enough to move forward.”
“What did he give you?” Garrett asked.
“The organization calls itself The Network. No elaborate codename, no mythological reference. Just The Network. Cell-based structure, compartmentalized communication, members identified by the tattoo Penn Crenshaw designed. Everything Sutton decoded from the sketchbooks tracks with Booker’s account. ”
Sutton clapped her hands together. “Yes.”
Claire’s gaze focused on her. “He claims the only reason he came after you was that you witnessed Ginger’s murder.
He believed you saw his face through the parlor window.
In his account, if he didn’t eliminate the witness, The Network would eliminate him.
No loose ends—that’s the operating principle.
He acted to protect himself as much as to serve the organization. ”
Sebastian processed that. “Was he after the sketchbooks, too?”
Claire shook her head. “He claims he didn’t know anything about them.”
“The plea?” Garrett asked.
“Reduced charges in exchange for full cooperation with the FBI’s investigation into The Network.
He’s providing names, operational methods, and communication protocols.
He’ll testify—if we make sure The Network doesn’t find a way to get to him.
Sounds like they can get to almost anyone, even in a high-security prison.
We’re working on protective custody. At this point, we have enough to open a formal investigation—not just an Inkwell file, but a full-scale federal case. ”
“That’s great,” Vivi said. “Incredible work, Agent.”
Claire smiled and nodded. “Which brings me to the most relevant piece for you, Sutton.” Her voice shifted—still professional, but warmer.
The Claire who was Garrett’s wife surfaced beneath the agent.
“With Booker in custody and cooperating, the direct threat against you is resolved. He was The Network’s operator in this region.
He was the one who killed Ginger. He was the one who attacked Dom.
And he had only come after you because he thought you were a witness. ”
She paused. Let it settle. “The FBI is officially closing the protective mandate. You can go home, Sutton.”
Sebastian watched the emotions move across Sutton’s face—disbelief, then a slow, cautious hope. Her lips parted. Her eyes filled but didn’t spill over. Her fingers curled around the notebook’s edge, gripping hard, as if the table might shift under her if she let go.
“Home,” she repeated.
Claire nodded. “We’ll maintain light surveillance for a few weeks as a precaution, and I’m sure SPS will also keep an eye on you for now, but the danger is over. We’ll need you to be accessible for testimony as the case develops, so stay in town.”
Sutton exhaled a long, shuddering breath, the sound of a woman releasing pressure she’d been holding for days. She turned in her chair and looked at Sebastian.
He saw it all in her face—the relief, the gratitude, and the fragile, tentative joy.
He smiled. “You heard her, Ink. You’re safe.”
Her hand found his beneath the table. Squeezed. He squeezed back.
The room exhaled with her. CB, who’d been patched in by phone, let out a whoop that was audible through the speaker.
Mack nodded once—his version of a standing ovation.
Jasper typed something rapidly, probably updating every file simultaneously.
Garrett caught Sebastian’s eye across the table and winked.
“Congratulations,” Vivi said to Sutton. “You must be relieved.”
Claire gathered her briefcase. Garrett touched her elbow and glanced at Sebastian again. “We’ll do an exit review and set up temporary support under your discretion after I walk Claire out.”
Sebastian nodded.
The team dispersed, Vivi squeezing Sutton’s shoulder as she passed.
When they were alone, Sutton sat at the table, still holding the notebook, her eyes bright, her cheeks flushed, looking lighter than Sebastian had ever seen her.
“I can go home,” she said. “I can go back to the apartment. See Dom. Start fixing up the parlor. Get the website up and running.” Her words tumbled over each other, the dam of suppressed hope cracking open all at once. “I can go home, Lynx.”
“Yeah.” He kept his voice steady and warm. The voice of a man who was genuinely happy for the woman in front of him. “You can.”
She launched out of the chair and hugged him. Her arms went around his neck, face pressed against his shoulder. He caught her, held her. Buried his face in her hair and breathed in the scent of her shampoo.
He was relieved. Deeply, viscerally relieved. She was safe. That was everything.
It was also the beginning of a question he didn’t know how to answer.
She pulled back. Her hands stayed on his shoulders. Her eyes searched his face. “You’re doing that thing,” she said.
“What thing?”
“The thing where your face says one thing and your brain is running worst-case scenarios behind it.” She tapped his temple with one finger. “I can practically hear the gears.”
He caught her hand and held it against his jaw. “Just processing.”
She kissed him—quick, firm. “Come on. Help me pack. I want to go see Dom before visiting hours end.”
She pulled away and headed for the room.
Sebastian sat there another moment. His chest held a complicated knot of relief, pride, joy, and the ache of watching the best thing that had ever happened to him walk toward a future he wasn’t sure included him.
The feelings are the information. The data was: come on, help me pack—not thank you for your service. Not I’ll always be grateful in that voice that said this is the end. No, she’d expressed the casual, proprietary assumption that he was coming with her.
The data appeared…hopeful.
He got up and followed her down the hall.